But for hundreds of years, people managed to subsist on what the land and the sea gave them, relying especially on the bird hunting of the sea stacks, such as Stac an Armin (Warrior Stac). Also, I loved the little quirks and values that made the uniqueness of each character, for example, Quilliam's excessive use of story-telling to distract everyone from their horrible situation. You would swear it was pushing its way upwards – a rock whale pitching its whole bulk into the sky, covered in barnacles, aiming to swallow the moon. She effortlessly conjures up the reality of everyday life on the sea stac where dead seabirds are used in place of candles, threaded with a wick so they burn right down to their feet.

I was flabbergasted that 'John' could go most of her life thinking she was a boy when really she was a girl. After surviving a suicide attempt, a fragile teen isn't sure she can endure without cutting herself. Murdina also frequently appears in Quilliam's dreams causing the other island inmates to accuse the girl of witchcraft.This story is about a group of boys and men who are abandoned and face not only perilous physical dangers but also the fear and risks of loneliness.

The landscape of the sea stack is brutally harsh and is a place where the desperation of the community to survive is made plain. Just because I have said that I do not really like it,though, it does not mean that it is a rubbish book because everyone has a different sort of taste and some people might actually end up liking this book if they read it. This book is about boys who go to a rock in the sea and kill birds to bring back for food to their home. How McCaughrean pulled this off with no knowledge whatsoever of what happened while they were there is a testament to human imagination, what it can create, what it can reveal in its world-building. While I clearly didn't enjoy this book, it's one I went into with mixed expectations and one I've come away from with very mixed thoughts and feelings for and can't stop thinking about.I'm still trying to comprehend what I just read but I don't want to put too much thought into it because I don't think it's worth it. The characters were all fine and I liked the interactions and relationships they all formed with one another over the course of the story. And for the boys, the trip to Stac an Amin does at first feel and is designed by McCaughrean as some kind of grand adventure, but this of course totally changing when the boat from Hirta does not come to collect the fowlers (and as the weeks of waiting begin to stretch to months and the birds begin to leave the sea stac, the party grows increasingly despondent and a sense of hopelessness begins to envelop everyone). I'm not sure I'd recommend this to children, and teens these days expect much more from characters, and especially romance. I will have to read more of McCaughrean's books to compare them to this one; however I would, overall, thoroughly recommend this read with a rating of 5 stars.

It pecked holes in the skin of their faces, it stole the feeling from noses and fingertips and ears. It's cute how the boys outgrown their shoes where the older ones passed their shoes down to the younger ones and how their voices also changed from a boy to a man during the time they were stranded. Geraldine McCaughrean has taken these bare facts and imagined the story of those terrible months and the characters of those who underwent them.Then there is Quill, a talented storyteller whose yarns play a crucial part in the heads and hearts of the castaways. Instead of seeing the boys descend into some sort of murderess madness and turn on one another, we seem them fall into more of an intense depression, the madness is definitely still there, but in general we see the boys stick together and get each other through this ordeal, which I think was a really interesting twist on what could have been a very cliche story. e. in relation to the characters’ mental deterioration) then it would’ve made for a more impactful story. Out of 10 I'd rate this 8 as historical accuracy is ok, but in parts tails away slightly into fantasy. When the story ends I was horrified and shocked like the boys… though it made total sense what happened.